Item N-1992-173: 0002 - [Interview of George Washington Porter]

• Sound recording

This item is a recording of an interview conducted by George Simeon in 1982-1984 with George Washington Porter. In this recording, Porter discusses his experience whaling on ships throughout Alaska and the Siberian Coast. He discusses the process of making muktuk and the uses of blubber. Porter also discusses the difference between home accommodations of Inuit in Alaska and Inuit in Siberia. He accounts his time as a reindeer herder for Louman Brothers. and recalls Laplanders in Siberia herding reindeer and having reindeer races. He also discusses Laplanders parading reindeer with Inuit from Alaska in Philadelphia and Baltimore in the United States. Porter recalls whaling and huting walrus around Banksland, Herrold Island and Cape Elizabeth and what the Inuit did with the whale and walrus. Inuit men would sell seal grease oil prsssed in tanks when they went on the ship to America. Later, American ships would have Inuit sail with them to hunt and skin walruses.